CHAMPCAR/CART: Long Beach: Saturday qualifying report

LONG BEACH POLE FOR
SEBASTIEN BOURDAIS MAKES HIM THE ACTIVE LEADER AMONG CHAMP CAR WORLD
SERIES DRIVERS
LONG BEACH (April 14, 2007) -- Rebounding from the toughest weekend
of his Champ Car career, Sebastien Bourdais ( ...

LONG BEACH POLE FOR
SEBASTIEN BOURDAIS MAKES HIM THE ACTIVE LEADER AMONG CHAMP CAR WORLD
SERIES DRIVERS

LONG BEACH (April 14, 2007) -- Rebounding from the toughest weekend
of his Champ Car career, Sebastien Bourdais (#1 McDonald's
Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone) resumed his march toward an unprecedented
fourth consecutive Champ Car title by winning the pole for Sunday's
Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach.

Bourdais earned his first pole of the year and the 26th of his career,
posting a best time of 1:07.546 (104.889 mph) around the 11-turn,
1.968-mile Long Beach street course. The Frenchman becomes the leader
among active drivers in terms of pole wins as his 26th pole broke a tie
with Paul Tracy for seventh on the all-time list.

Saturday's qualifying session saw a flurry of early activity where
nearly everyone in the 17-car field established their quick times in the
first half of the 30-minute outing. The last among the 17 combatants to
hit the track today, Bourdais needed just five laps to card his best
time, leaving the rest of the field to play catch up.

Friday qualifying leader Will Power (#5 Aussie Vineyards
Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone) kept in close touch with Bourdais as he looked
to duplicate his Las Vegas pole, but a slight bobble in the final turn in
his final qualifying lap left Power in the second spot with a time of
1:07.695 (104.658 mph). He finished just ahead of his Team Australia
stablemate Simon Pagenaud (#15 Aussie Vineyards
Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone), who established a career-high by securing a
third-place starting spot after posting a time of 1:07.883 (104.368 mph).

The second half of the session was mostly an exercise in futility as none
of the drivers were able to better their times after the 15-minute mark,
although there was one last bit of drama caused by a Katherine Legge (#11
Dale Coyne Racing Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone) spin with five minutes left
in the session.

Legge's spin and subsequent stall in the final turn brought out a
red flag as most of the drivers were just getting warmed up for their
final shots at the pole. The scarlet banner stoppage was quickly cleaned
up by the Holmatro Champ Car Safety Team, leaving the Champ Car pilots
just one lap each to unseat Bourdais.

Power came closest on that final pass, keeping pace with Bourdais on the
speed traces all the way until the final hairpin, where his brief bobble
doomed him to a second-place result. Pagenaud ended up third while Alex
Tagliani (#8 LXN2 Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone) backed up his Las Vegas
performance by snaring the fourth spot for Sunday's race, the same
spot where he started and finished in during the season-opening weekend.

A pair of rookies will make up the third row, though they took vastly
different routes to get there. Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racing's Graham
Rahal (#2 MEDI|ZONE Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone) will start in the top five
for the first time in his brief Champ Car career after hanging a time of
1:08.170 (103.928 mph), while Robert Doornbos (#14 Muermans/Jumbo
Supermarkten/Mediamall Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone) will start sixth
despite spending the entire second half of the session sitting by the
side of the track.

Doornbos was one of the earliest cars out during the qualifying session
and put up his best time of 1:08.183 (103.909 mph) after seven laps. But
seven laps was all he would get as he lost power on his eighth lap, but
alertly moved his Minardi Team USA machine into a safe haven, allowing
him to avoid bringing out a red flag that would have cost him his best
lap time.

Justin Wilson (#9 CDW Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone) posted his best
qualifying result of the year with a seventh-place run while Bruno
Junqueira (#19 Sonny's Bar-B-Q Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone) snared
the eighth spot. Rookie Tristan Gommendy (#22 Pay By Touch
Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone) will grid a personal-best ninth while Mario
Dominguez (#7 Telmex Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone) rounded out the top 10.

2005 Champ Car runner-up Oriol Servia (#3 Indeck
Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone) made his first appearance of the season and
will start 14th in tomorrow's race as he sits in for the injured
Tracy in the Forsythe Championship Racing machine. Tracy was injured in
an accident in the morning's practice, where he suffered a
compression fracture to his L-1 vertebrae. Tracy has been released from
the hospital but will not compete in Sunday's Champ Car event.

The timed event will begin at 1:00 p.m. local time (4:00 p.m. Eastern)
and can be seen live on NBC. Fans can also follow all of the action via
the official website of the Champ Car World Series, www.champcar.ws.

QUOTES FROM THE TOP THREE FINISHERS

Sebastien Bourdais: I was pretty happy to see that Will made a mistake
because it would have been difficult. It's tough, when you start like
this, there's a last-minute rush after a red flag like this, and you
start from the back in the pits, it's difficult. It makes life pretty
stressful. So we hopefully are going to have a better weekend and better
race tomorrow. We'll have a better pit selection so we don't have to go
through this again.

Will Power: I got my best lap on the last lap on my first run. And then
the last, the second run, there was the red flag. You know, our tires
were almost up to temperature, so we were first out of pit lane. I think
we were less than half a 10th off Sebastien's time, but I pushed too hard
in the hairpin, I lost it all there.

Simon Pagenaud: Well, again, the car was really good. I've been doing a
very good job in the practice this morning with Will and all the team.
The car feels very good to me. I did my fastest lap on my set from
yesterday, the red Bridgestone tires from yesterday. So I guess we did a
very good performance today. I'm very proud of the Aussie Vineyards
team.